This is an
excerpt from the book "The toys, what's inside" (1868), reprinted few,
Henri Nicolle devoted to the exhibition of 1867. Poupendol drew a long
extract on Huret dolls which a site has already been spent.François
Theimer, doll expert, had organized a superb exhibition for this topic
at the Hotel Ambassadeurs in November 2008. We
were
exceptionally allowed
to photograph these wonders. All these pictures that enrich this
article are from this magnificent exhibition.
Enjoy, they are rare and
will be even more over time .....

"The
dolls are saying Huret, named after their inventor, created a new
industry in the luxury trade dolls, and, as such,
they have marked
their place in the history of toys

You
see them at the Exhibition , you had already seen the Boulevard
Montmartre, showing their childish graces the front of their own home.
they are of little blond, eyes glazed porcelain in Figure and are
dressed in little girl in the latest fashion of Updated: short skirts,
bare legs and turned shod with open shoes, or fur coats, sleeves and
boots Hungarian inaccordance season.
Vienne
after the carnival, bearing as Perrette,
simple cotillion even
cute shoes with blue socks, they are disguised
as Norman dairy and
cotton cap on his ear makes all mischievous.

în
ordinary times, miss living in that beautiful furniture to her size,
receives her friends and their offer tea service in miniature.

But
we must believe that bedtime has come: the wearing of this night, all
in a big long shirt, next to a cradle which lacks nothing inside or
pillow lace, nor quilted coverlet, or, outside the muslin curtains
lined with pink, "That, we close these curtains are wise, young ladies,
and do not wake up your mommy."

Hats, gloves, jewelry, dresses and body linen, chairs, beds and
bedding, the trousseau nor does the furniture is poor; I see even if by
chance the young person is traveling, her trunk compartment and her bag
in hand.

In
the mind of the inventor, who is a woman, the first doll she delivered
almost naked, had to be dressed by the child who was in possession, but
the fingers of little girls are clumsy and soon obliged to assist them,
the moms who had other things to do, asked to buy clothes made. It was
then that dressmakers, furriers, shoemakers, cabinetmakers an end, and
... layetiers all trades worked on models in this new industry that has
Huret dolls gave birth and who created both special workers because it
is noticeable that the ordinary seamstresses, for example, refuse to
work for the dolls.

The
job is not bad, however, women earn from March to April francs per day.
It was founded in the vicinity of the Rue de Choiseul, houses of making
dolls that have been repeatedly fortunes.
The Huret
doll
itself was an improvement on the doll skin which has dethroned king and
who was movement. Gutta-percha used in its manufacture allows casting
aside its various parts, arms and legs, after being assembled by
mounting them on the nuts
which are obtained through the joints.

The "Art of
being a grandfather".
Jeanne and Georges on the knees of Victor Hugo

We
know what it is that the gutta-percha, a rubber cousin, who, like him,
runs an incision from a tree native to India. The best gutta-percha
seems to be that of Ceylon, its applications in industry are numerous,
it has the disadvantage of coming from far away, therefore be very
expensive, and far more expensive than the natives know bring in the
blocks shipped, earth and stones of a certain weight. It certainly hear
the land use,
and we see that as long as anyone wants to go, he finds
people to understand the trade.

Anyway,
the price of the gutta-percha , which varies from 11 F. to 14
F. en kilogram,
explains the high price of the doll Huret, and the figure of 12 to 1500
dolls, relatively small, its annual production.

But
the doll was made and the advantage to survive accidents that are
waiting for the dolls in this world. When the skin once received a
scratch on his escape through the wound, gradually topic was losing
blood, the body becomes flaccid, members boning, it was all over, and
before that dreadful decline, it There was no doctor to plead, he was
crying child, the less shock front still outweighed the head and the
tears could not read anything there.

Today,
what is a cracked head ! The merchant sees that . Is it serious ? He
brought to the factory in L'Isle-Adam a bareheaded all similar and
applies it to the place of another. If the hair of the former has
received no damage, he planted even on the news, so that the eye of a
mother can not be mistaken, it's the same girl. Is it an arm, a leg,
they shall also well and, whatever the fracture, there is a remedy for
everything, and yet the hospice Miss Huret sometimes see rare cases,
one witness which it keeps the memory clinic.

It was winter at the corner of a stove: a small girl holding
her doll would get cold feet, he was introduced with care in the mouth
heat. Gutta-percha melts at a certain temperature. Horror! when the
child wanted her baby bed warmed, the toe was sticking to the pan, and
as she made an effort to remove it, as it was pulling, leg lengthening.
The doll, with legs a yard, arrived from the provinces with a letter
which contained many recommendations
about the poor crippled, and who
said:
"I have so much grief to part with her when she is
so sick.
Miss do not do too much pain, and if it should be long, give me,
I
laughed at his new ".

If
I was the least bit moralistic, this little letter which reflects the
gentle awakening in a child of maternal feelings, give me a natural
transition to protest against the customs of other dolls of my time.

It
shows me at this time, dressed in little ladies, posting an insolent
luxury dresses trains; cheeky, they look at me through a pince-nez, and
walk, a little dog under his arm, with "follow- me young man "hung
back, I blush for them.

When
the doll was a baby, the child was her little mother, and she paid her
care, according to those she received, as it were learning of his
future role in society. Today she can no longer be the maid and these
beautiful ugly ladies as may learn a lot. As we already said that no
more
children, before possibly, probably, we can say that there is more than
dolls. One, undoubtedly, is the consequence of the other, and it
probably still enough to allow me to pass abruptly to another subject.

One
more word yet on the hair are Huret dolls. The Astrakhan was first
tried for hair, but he had ears which made them give up, it could also
due to a line, cut the little wig in the middle of the back of the
animal. Today, manufacturing makes use of the goat of Tibet."

That's
good information and photos that you will learn much, surely, on the
famous Huret dolls that can not will soon have hundreds more but by
tens or less ... ... ..! Although those that exist are the subject of
the greatest care of their owners and are fairly low, which is normal
for their rarity, importance and beauty bunch of manufacture.